Poison in the Blood - [Part 2]
Posted on Thu Sep 25th, 2014 @ 3:41am by
Mission: The Art of the Hunt [Incomplete]
Starbase 48, in orbit of Cestus III
“Bram,” Commander Liza Parsons said, downing the blue liquid in one shot, “who is the girl?”
“Liza Parsons, Elizabeth Heyworth,” he said, looking at Heyworth. “Elizabeth, Liza.”
“Heyworth…” Parsons lofted both brows. “His daughter?” She laughed. “My, my, you’ve thinned out,” she said, eyeing the young Starfleet officer.
Heyworth looked at Parsons. “Who are you exactly?” she asked curtly.
“She’s a senior attaché for Starfleet Intelligence,” Stern said. “We used to work together. She’s a friend…”
--
Stern’s vision swam for a moment. He could still see Heyworth talking, but even just thinking about Liza Parsons made his vision blur and his chest hurt. Liza Parsons… Chesa... He closed his eyes again and tried to push her out of his weathered mind.
--
“New Jericho,” Parsons said, her words coming out heavy and slurred, the memory skewed and inaccurate. Stern tried to put the pieces together… She was telling him that Tillmar was in New Jericho, on Cestus III.
There was a flash of energy and thing sped up. They were on New Jericho now.
The flask was in his hand then. The sweet, sweet release of the whiskey hitting the back of his throat, burning the entire way down, warming his insides… It rushed through him. He could feel it, even now, two months sober. When he looked at his hands there was no flask. He was just thirsty.
--
Glare-shades, thick, round, and dark, glinted in the high sun. The air was dry and hot, and dust kicked up as the car ripped across the barren wasteland.
New Jericho looked like a town on the edge death; sandstone structures built like dome mounds in the middle of nowhere, clustered around what appeared to be the only source of water out this far; a single well. Stern pulled back on the throttle and the car slowed to a crawl.
He peeled back the glare-shades and blinked a few time; the sky was a sharp blue, almost painful.
Elizabeth found the atmosphere fascinating. As she adjusted her eyes to the change in light, she started internally going through all of the biological intricacies of the climate, unaware of being looked at.
Townsfolk watched them as the car glided through the dirt street; old men and women, weather-worn and thin, as well as children and young couples just starting out, all stopped what they were doing to stare at the Starfleet Officer's passing through.
While Starfleet certainly had a presence on Cestus III, it was clear that they did not have much of one here.
"Where do we go from here?" she asked casually, her mind more on the science of the area then on the purpose of their being there.
"Eastern edge of town," Stern said. "There's a Starfleet clinic there."
She nodded once. "This is where..." she started, letting him finish the statement.
He furrowed his brow, but let the statement hang in the air as the car sped across town. "Let's go see if the Doctor is in," he said.
Stern killed Tillmar that day.
--
Ibraham Stern
Infiltration Specialist
